Welcome to Hyperion Records, an independent British classical label devoted to presenting high-quality recordings of music of all styles and from all periods from the twelfth century to the twenty-first.

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Introduction

Unusually, Helges Treue (‘Helge’s Loyalty’) derives from another composer’s work: Felix Draeseke (1835-1913) composed a song to the ballad by Moritz, Graf von Strachwitz, and Liszt, who did much to encourage his pupil Draeseke’s work, adapted it as a recitation. For some reason Liszt’s piece remained unpublished until 1874 when his interest in melodrama returned. The music is fulsomely Romantic, and Liszt’s fingerprints are almost indistinguishable from the original once-famed student’s homage to his master’s style.

Leslie Howard’s recordings of Liszt’s complete piano music, on 99 CDs, is one of the monumental achievements in the history of recorded music. Remarkable as much for its musicological research and scholarly rigour as for Howard’s Herculean piano p ...» More

King Helge fell in heated battle, And with him fell his beloved maid, She fell – why should she wish to live? King Helge, the hero, and the maid Sigrun, Lay together, together in the hillside: His stallion lay outside.

All-Father sat on Ida’s field: “Truly shall a powerful hero come Today from the earth; My wolf is howling and eats no more, And Gjaller’s bridge is thundering heavily, As though I myself were riding over”.

King Helge entered Odin’s palace In black steel, a sinister guest, He strode in silence through the heroes, He strode through without greeting or thanks And sat down on the last bench And did not look around him.

The heroes sprang up to game and combat, Ha! Clashing shields and stamp of hooves, How densely it surged, with glittering steel! King Helge sat, no horn sounded from him, No spear sped from him, no spur jangled; King Helge did not spar.

“It is pleasant here in All-Father’s hall, The floor of gold, the roof of steel, And the silvery air. Yet even if Heaven were as bright again, I would give the whole of Heaven For Sigrun’s narrow grave!”

Then up stepped with eyes of violet blue The most white-breasted war-virgin; How her face shone! She held the horn, she drank to him: “My slender hero, now you drink!” King Helge did not drink.

“Even if I were loved ardently by a hundred virgins, As slim as the roedeer, as white as the snow grouse, I would hardly lift my eyes. Take your horn and leave me, You are not half as beautiful as Sigrun; My dreams are with Sigrun!”

So he sits obstinately and is silent, Till black-eyed midnight flickers down. Then the spirit is free to act. Then his eyes flame and his sword rustles, Then he girds up his red-gold horse: Then it’s off to Sigrun.

How wild the rider, how wild the ride, How sonorously pounds the stallion’s stride, It’s off to Sigrun! The air melts away and the earth bursts, When the Nordic prince rides down, To rest with Sigrun.

When the morning wind cools the horse’s sweat, Then, reluctantly, he rides home; His ride is sad and gentle. He rides in silence through Wallhall’s portal And sits down as before And waits for midnight.